{"id":109385,"date":"2026-06-30T00:30:35","date_gmt":"2026-06-30T00:30:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/109385\/"},"modified":"2026-06-30T00:30:35","modified_gmt":"2026-06-30T00:30:35","slug":"decision-on-what-to-do-with-24-sussex-took-a-decade-the-donation-link-took-just-a-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/109385\/","title":{"rendered":"Decision on what to do with 24 Sussex took a decade, the donation link took just a day"},"content":{"rendered":"

While it took the federal government more than a decade to\u00a0come up with\u00a0a plan for the future of the prime minister’s official residence, the\u00a0online path\u00a0to raise private money for 24 Sussex Dr.\u00a0got off the ground\u00a0within\u00a0a single working day.<\/p>\n

By midday Monday, the foundation running the government’s efforts to pass the hat around to support the renovation for the 35-room stone mansion had already added a donation path to its website<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Rideau Hall Foundation did not\u00a0immediately\u00a0return calls Monday from National Post, but the Canadian Press reported that the site had already raised more than $100,000 towards the renovation project. The average donation, the report said, was about $257.<\/p>\n

Prime Minister Mark Carney\u00a0announced the government’s intention\u00a0Friday\u00a0to launch an open\u00a0competition\u00a0for bids to renovate the historic home, which has been vacant for 11 years.\u00a0The announcement\u00a0ended\u00a0a big part of the decade-old\u00a0mystery about the future of\u00a0the prime minister’s official residence, which had been plagued by\u00a0an array of problems:\u00a0heating and cooling,\u00a0outdated wiring,\u00a0asbestos,\u00a0water damage,\u00a0mould, rats, and more practical problems such as\u00a0insufficient\u00a0space for\u00a0offices\u00a0and\u00a0events.<\/p>\n

Carney said the\u00a0foundation,\u00a0a non-partisan charity that aims to\u00a0support\u00a0national programming in learning,\u00a0leadership, and community building,\u00a0would lead the fundraising effort\u00a0and\u00a0establish\u00a0most of the rules for ethical questions.<\/p>\n

When asked about the potential for the fundraising effort\u00a0opening\u00a0the government up to\u00a0possible\u00a0ethical or conflict breaches, Carney said it’s unlikely that corporate donations or those worth more than 10 per cent of the project’s value would be accepted.<\/p>\n

The foundation’s website, however, does not yet appear to offer filters to prevent such donations, or at least easy ways around those principles.\u00a0\u00a0Another filter promised by Carney, that only Canadians can donate, presumably to eliminate the risk of foreign interference, appears to be relying on the honor system, asking donors to confirm that they’re “a Canadian citizen or a Canadian permanent resident.”<\/p>\n

The site allows for donations, however, to be made in dozens of currencies, including American dollars, Russian rubles and Chinese yuan.<\/p>\n

Duff Conacher, co-founder of Democracy Watch, which advocates for democratic reform, said the process has not so far closed all the ethical loopholes, despite already being open for donations.<\/p>\n

An individual corporate leader or\u00a0a\u00a0corporate-affiliated\u00a0foundation, for example, could make a hefty donation, Conacher said, as a front for\u00a0a\u00a0business\u00a0seeking influence or trying to curry\u00a0favour. Only legislation would\u00a0make the rules legally binding, he added.<\/p>\n

Heritage advocates\u00a0cheered\u00a0last week’s\u00a0announcement\u00a0to renovate and\u00a0perhaps expand\u00a0the\u00a0historic\u00a0home,\u00a0but some\u00a0argued that the government should just pay the bill, instead of trying to raise money to help shrink the costs to taxpayers.<\/p>\n

Built in the late 1860s by a lumber baron and MP, the home has been the prime minister’s official residence since 1951 and home to 10 Canadian leaders.<\/p>\n

Carney\u00a0and his predecessor Justin\u00a0Trudeau\u00a0instead lived\u00a0at Rideau Cottage, across the road from 24 Sussex on the grounds of the Governor General’s residence at Rideau Hall.<\/p>\n

The big remaining question is whether\u00a0decision makers\u00a0opt to\u00a0complete a modest renovation that makes the building functional for future prime ministers, or whether it plans to create something more elaborate that serves as a national showpiece.<\/p>\n

\"Screenshot<\/p>\n

Screenshot of the donation page for 24 Sussex Drive on the Rideau Hall Foundation website.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0past two\u00a0Liberal governments\u00a0have avoided\u00a0making a decision\u00a0about the property for\u00a0a\u00a0decade,\u00a0presumably\u00a0out\u00a0of concern to be\u00a0spending\u00a0taxpayer\u00a0dollars on their own leader, particularly during a housing crisis.\u00a0Carney has emphasized that the restoration will be for future leaders, as the\u00a0job\u00a0will extend beyond his time in office.<\/p>\n

But the eventual cost\u00a0will\u00a0likely present\u00a0a\u00a0political\u00a0challenge.\u00a0The specific plans chosen for the site will\u00a0largely dictate\u00a0the final bill, but\u00a0it’s\u00a0a near certainty\u00a0that any plan will\u00a0stretch well into the\u00a0tens of millions of dollars. Five years ago,\u00a0the National Capital Commission (NCC)\u00a0said it would cost $36.6 million to restore 24 Sussex Drive to “good condition”\u00a0and that price tag did not include any grand expansions or new buildings.<\/p>\n

In addition to the living areas,\u00a0the\u00a0property also features\u00a0an official guest house, a swimming pool and pool house,\u00a0a detached garage, and\u00a0security\u00a0buildings\u00a0and small gatehouses at the entrance for security screening.<\/p>\n

National Post<\/p>\n

Our website is the place for the latest breaking news, exclusive scoops, longreads and provocative commentary. Please bookmark nationalpost.com<\/a> and sign up for our daily newsletter, Posted, here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"While it took the federal government more than a decade to\u00a0come up with\u00a0a plan for the future of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":109386,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[98],"tags":[15101,11965,38445,38447,111,5430,26033,4773,38446,14420],"class_list":["post-109385","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mark-carney","tag-24-sussex-drive","tag-community-building","tag-duff-conacher","tag-fundraising-effort","tag-mark-carney","tag-national-post","tag-official-residence","tag-prime-minister-of-canada","tag-renovation-project","tag-rideau-hall"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109385","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=109385"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109385\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/109386"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=109385"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=109385"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=109385"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}